Chippewa Falls Police on Wednesday released squad car video of a Nov. 30 traffic stop in which Casey E. Kressin died after the vehicle he was riding in was pulled over by police for speeding and failing to stop at a red traffic light.
The nearly 11-minute video shows a patrol officer at 2:05 a.m. catching up to a speeding vehicle on Highway 29 at Chippewa County Boulevard.
The black-and-white video shows that after the officer pulls up behind the stopped car, Kressin exited the vehicle and waved at the officer. He then kneels to the pavement.
Driver Leah Hryniewicki is hysterical.
“He can’t breathe!” she shouts. “He’s having an asthma attack!”
She added: “He’s going to die! This has happened before.”
Hryniewicki goes on to say that Kressin, 29, had been using a nebulizer to breathe.
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Within approximately 40 seconds of the officer arriving at the scene, he can be heard paging an EMS unit.
“Can you bring him to the hospital?” Hryniewicki asks. She later asks about the enroute ambulance: “Where is it? Where did it go?”
A second officer arrived at the scene.
“Can’t we just go? I would have made it there,” Hryniewicki said.
“Help please,” Kressin said. He then asks Hryniewicki to hold him.
An officer says while he can’t provide medical treatment to Kressin, the ambulance has medications on board including oxygen.
Hryniewicki calmed down, telling Kressin to focus on his breathing.
The ambulance arrives approximately 5 minutes and 50 seconds after the officer called for it. Kressin is placed on a stretcher within about 70 seconds, and the ambulance leaves for HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls approximately 2 minutes and 20 seconds after it arrived.
Kressin, 29, died at the hospital.
Chippewa Falls Police Chief Wendy Stelter has defended the officer’s decision to call an ambulance rather than having an upset driver continuing to the hospital.
